For three years of the blood-oath bond, every meal carried into the Valecrest den had been prepared by my father's hands and mine.
Even when fever burned through us, when our bodies trembled and our wolves whined low beneath our skins, Dorian never once crossed the threshold of the cookfire-hall. The room existed beneath his notice, as did the labor of those who loved him.
Yet now he was willing to simmer broth for another she-wolf.
A bitter laugh escaped my throat, the sound of something vital being severed. It felt as though someone had taken a blade to my chest and carved me open with surgical precision. Somewhere beneath my ribs, my wolf went utterly still, the way a creature goes still when it knows the wound is fatal.
Before sliding into the waiting obsidian carriage, Vesper turned back. Her face arranged itself into an expression of wounded kindness, fragile innocence painted across her features like a masterwork of deception. The scent of her drifted to me on the cold air, candied jasmine over something faintly rotten, threaded with the chill of wolfsbane.
"Do not dirty your hands because of disgusting people, Seraphina." Her voice carried the tremor of a saint offering absolution. "The Moon Goddess always brings justice."
The onlookers were instantly moved to tears. Some of them, pack-strangers who knew nothing of the blood and betrayal that had brought us to this moment, actually spat on me as I stood there.
More wolves cursed as they walked away, their words trailing behind them like poison on the wind.
I straightened myself slowly, methodically. Every wound on my body burned with fresh agony, but I would not give them the satisfaction of watching me crumble.
When I thought of my father, of Garrick lying broken in that healer-clinic cot, I gritted my teeth until I tasted copper and rushed back through the streets.
Wolves pointed at me everywhere I passed. Whispers followed me like shadows, and beneath them, I caught the shift in their scents, suspicion curdling to contempt.
That was when I understood. The mind-link recording from the Council tribunal had already gone viral across the spirit network. Someone had made certain of it.
Vesper Thornecroft had become the delicate angel that thousands wanted to protect, the innocent victim of a vicious bloodline's schemes. Meanwhile, my father and I were being cursed as parasites, villains, and oath-breakers. The narrative had been flipped with the precision of a tracker scrubbing every scent from a kill-site.
When I walked into the den of healing, my father was wrapped in layers of bandages, both legs shattered beyond recognition. Even his breathing trembled with pain, each inhale a small act of courage. The warm hearth-smoke scent that had always meant safety to me was buried now under blood and the bitter tang of suffering.
I nearly collapsed from the weight pressing against my chest.
Others in the room murmured their complaints, their voices carrying the particular cruelty of the self-righteous.
"A wolf like that is vicious. Crippling himself just to fake a hunt-kill accident."
"He better not try to extort anyone. Tell them to get out before they bring more trouble onto the pack."
I tried desperately to explain, to make them understand that Garrick Duskmoor had been set up, that the staged hunt-kill was no accident but a calculated strike. No one wanted to believe me. They had already chosen their truth.
My father listened to their words, shaking with impotent rage as he pounded the cot with what little strength remained in his broken body. I felt his wolf straining beneath his ruined limbs, snarling at a threat it could no longer rise to meet.
He had spent his whole life serving the bloodline faithfully, helping others, keeping the border supply-routes clean and the patrols steady. Yet here he was, being insulted like a common rogue, all because he had trusted the wrong wolves.
He looked at me with eyes that had lost their light.
"I treated Dorian like a son, Seraphina. I watched him grow. I taught him to track, to run the border. He has never been wronged in his life, not by me, not by anyone in our pack. Why would he help others hurt me?" His voice cracked. "What did I do wrong?"
I could no longer hold back the tears. They streamed down my face in hot, silent rivers.
But the wolves around us kept mocking, their words like salt ground into open wounds.
"You are all vicious. This is the retribution you deserve."
More and more crowded around the doorway, throwing filthy and hateful looks at us as though we were caged beasts to be gawked at. The pack-frenzy had taken hold, that particular madness that turns ordinary wolves cruel when they run together against one.
I could not bear to let my father suffer another second of this humiliation. I decided to take him from the clinic, to bring him somewhere safe where the vultures could not reach.
But when the clinic's keeper brought the blood-settlement scroll, I froze completely.
All the charges had been raised to more than ten times the original sum. Healing rites that should have cost a few gold moons now demanded tens of thousands. The numbers swam before my eyes.
The bought healer lowered his voice, his eyes sliding away from mine, his throat tilting just slightly in the reflex of a wolf who knows he is in the wrong.
"You offended someone you should not have, Lady Valecrest. Some debts must be paid, one way or another."
Pack-warriors surrounded me like hunters blocking their prey, their presence a silent threat that required no elaboration. They wore the blank expressions of wolves who had done this before and would do it again without hesitation.
It was clear they would not let us leave without the gold.
My hands trembled as I drew out my crystal communicator, calling up the tribute-account with fingers that felt like they belonged to someone else.
The balance had become zero.
Dorian had transferred everything out. Every coin of tribute, every gold moon I had saved, every resource I might have used to protect my father, gone.
I linked him at once, my heart pounding against my ribs like a caged animal.
Dorian's voice was lazy when he answered, almost amused. The voice of an Alpha who held all the cards and knew it.
"Vesper has been having trouble sleeping, Seraphina. Consider this her emotional compensation."
I could not stop myself from shouting into the communicator, all pretense of composure abandoned.
"That is my father's healing fee. He needs the rites. He needs care."
"As long as you publicly admit you slandered Vesper, that you fabricated evidence against her, she will give you a large payout." Dorian's tone remained calm, reasonable, as though he were discussing a minor border arrangement rather than my father's life. "His legs are already broken. There is no point saving them. Better to admit guilt and let him spend the rest of his days comfortably in his den."
A pause. Then, softer: "Once this is over, I will live well with you again. Things can go back to how they were."
The next moment, I heard a heavy thud on his end, the sound of a body falling against furs, followed by breathy, intimate sounds that left no room for misinterpretation.
Realization struck me like a bullet to the chest.
My communicator slipped from my hand and clattered against the floor. I covered my mouth, fighting the violent urge to vomit as the sounds continued, muffled now but unmistakable. Deep inside me, my wolf turned her face away, as if she could not bear to hear it either.
Before the bought healer could call for enforcers, the trackers arrived.
Two pack-trackers in rumpled coats pushed through the crowd, their Council sigils catching the cold lamplight.
"Vesper Thornecroft and Dorian Valecrest reported that your father attempted to extort them. We need to bring him in for questioning before the Council."
My father had just finished his healing rites. The pain was still written across his face in lines of agony, his broken body held together by bandages and sheer will.
I fell to my knees and begged, my dignity abandoned on the cold clinic floor.
The trackers could only shake their heads, their expressions carrying the particular helplessness of wolves following orders they did not agree with.
"These are orders from above, my lady. We cannot do anything. Our hands are tied."
I tried to block the cot, to put my body between them and my father, but they said I was obstructing Council law. That I would be chained in silver too if I did not step aside.
My father was dragged away violently, his protests weak and breathless. The bandages on his legs turned red with fresh blood, blooming like roses against the white gauze.
I ran after them, my steps clicking against the stone floor in a desperate rhythm.
But when I reached the corner of the corridor, a black hood suddenly came down over my head, plunging the world into darkness.
A storm of fists and kicks crashed down on me from every direction.
"How dare you lay a hand on Dorian's she-wolf." The voice was rough, low with righteous fury, a growl rumbling beneath the words. "Learn your place."
"Do not kill her. She is still Dorian's oath-mate." Another voice, more cautious. "The Alpha would not want that kind of heat on the pack."
"Oath-mate?" A cruel laugh. "Dorian never cared about her. His heart has always been with Vesper. If Seraphina had not forced herself into the blood-oath bond, she would never have been mated to him. Every wolf knows that."
I did not know how long the beating lasted before they finally left, their footsteps fading into silence.
I lay curled on the cold floor, motionless, like a discarded rag someone had wrung dry and thrown away. My wolf did not howl. She did not whimper. She only lay down inside me in the dark, as broken and silent as I was.
The taste of blood filled my mouth. Above me, the moonlamps buzzed their indifferent song.
